NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court has transferred a case related to the 2014 death of Rohit Radhakrishnan, a final year MBBS student of A J Medical Institute, Kuntikana, Mangaluru, to the CBI, Bangaluru.
After noting that CID, Bengaluru did not carry out the investigation in a fair manner, a bench of Justices M R Shah and M M Sundresh directed for handing over the entire case materials to the CBI within two months.
The top court's order came on November 3 after hearing advocate Jogy Scaria on behalf of father of deceased, M S Radhakrishnan, a practicing advocate from Kerala.
Strangely, the bench noted, the Bengaluru CID, directed to further investigate the matter, filed an "abated charge sheet" against the deceased for rash and negligent driving, "unheard of" in criminal proceedings.
"We are not at all satisfied with the further investigation carried out by the CID, Bengaluru. The truth must come out after thorough and proper investigation. In the present case, the CID, Bengaluru has failed to perform its duty by not thoroughly investigating the case," the bench said.
"Under the circumstances, this is a fit case to exercise the powers under Article 32 of the Constitution and to transfer the investigation of the case to the CBI, Bengaluru," the bench further said.
The court set aside the charge sheet against the deceased and ordered the CID Bengaluru to pay Rs one lakh as cost to the petitioner within four weeks.
It also directed the CBI to file a status report before the Karnataka High Court every two months.
The petitioner claimed his son Rohit had died under extremely mysterious circumstances on March 22, 2014. His body was found severed from the head. The police projected the case as road accident though his son never rode bike as he had a Honda City car.
The father referred to several circumstances, including role of friends of the deceased, claiming Arjun Panicker and Gopikrishnan, who were with the deceased right before he went missing. "Their role is highly suspicious and the explanations that they offered to is riddled with improbabilities and contradictions," the father claimed.
He also accused his son's teacher Dr Jayaprakash of embalming the body of the deceased, which ensured no second post mortem could be conducted. He said Dr Jayaprakash harboured a grudge against his son, as his complaint following an alleged ragging incident in 2009 had resulted his removal as hostel warden.
Based on the representation of the father, the investigation of the case was handed over to (H and B) CID, Bangaluru.
Though the CID was conducting the investigaton, the victims father was certain that the manner in which the investigation was done he would not get justice from the agency as they were trying to close the case of his son as an accidental death.
On February 2015, the victim's father sent a letter to the Chief Minister of Karnataka appealing for the formation of an impartial enquiry team or to transfer the investigation to a credible agency, such as the CBI, to investigate the real cause of the death of his son.
Since there was no action on his request, on April, 2016, the victim's father filed writ petition before the High Court of Karnataka praying that the investigation be handed over to CBI, Bangaluru which may conclude the investigation within a time frame.
During the pendency of the said writ petition, the CID filed B report before the Magistrate Court thereby closing the investigation and concluding the case as an accidental death.
Accordingly the High Court disposed the case granting the petitioner "liberty to challenge the B report, as per law. The Writ Appeal filed by the Petitioner to set aside the order of the Single was aso dismissed.
The father of the deceased yet again moved another representation before the Chief Minister of Karnataka to conduct further investigation regarding his son's mysterious death which was positively heeded to and a direction was given to the CID to conduct the further investigation into the case.
On the request of the CID, the Magistrate Court in the month of August, 2021, granted the Police Inspector, (H and B) CID, Bangaluru permission to continue the further investigation.
During this time, the victim's father moved to the Supreme Court for change of the investigating agency.
Read Order
